Red Button

Sometimes you've got to know when to hit the big red button, pull the plug and get out of there.

I experienced this quandry up on the Croesus Track at the weekend, 2hr 45 into the tramp, around 45mins from the Ces Clarke Hut, as a blizzard closed in around me.

Continue onto the hut, or turn around and get out of there?

I'm a fairly willful tyke at the best of times (marching up the steep end of the Croesus for a bet in the first place) but the fact I'd seen no one else on the track, the fact it was becoming difficult to pick out the next snow pole, and the advice from DOC that there "may or may not be fuel up there", all started weighing on my mind.

I stood for a full 30secs to a minute in the blizzard before I made the decision to turn around and walk the 3 hours back down the hill.

So like a wet dog I plodded back down the hill, with cramp in both legs setting in and increasing visions of the food I would eat when I arrived at the bottom. It took me easily as long to get down as it did to get up.

Abort Abort, and I think it was the right decision. Having seen the snow on the hills this morning, I think I would have been wading back through it this morning. Oh, and chatting to DOC about it today, they let me know that the track had been closed from the other end whilst they were repairing the swing bridges... so I would've been alone on the hill, wet & cold and possibly without fuel. Instead I celebrated my decision making by going to the pub and ordering the fattest steak on the menu.

Perhaps I shouldn't try to fight the West Coast winter ~ at least I learnt the easy way instead of the hard way this time.